In the 20th century, the Soviet regime in Estonia and the Franco regime in Catalonia tried to extend their political ideologies. Autochthonous languages were controlled through censorship and repression. Furthermore, as part of their ideologies, Francoist and Soviet leaders wanted to replace indigenous languages with their own (Russian and Spanish), since these were a major part of the new order they were trying to create. This thesis compares and contrasts the various methods of language control to demonstrate that centralized multilingual states, whatever their political ideology, can employ surprisingly similar systems, depriving language communities of the right to use and develop their own languages.

In both cases, most people paid scant attention to the official public language or its ideology, and in Estonia, one can talk of two socio-linguistic worlds, one official and Sovietized and the other unofficial and very national in character (P. Vihalemm & Lauristin, 1997). The Catalans also tenaciously maintained their private cultural and linguistic world. The effect of centralized control on national culture and, consequently on the language also, should nonetheless not be overlooked: language tolerance of Russian-speakers (in the case of Estonia) and Spanish-speakers (in the case of Catalonia) even if they spoke Estonian or Catalan can be viewed as part of the continuation of the «minority complex»1 (Druviete, 2003, p. 5) that took shape under authoritarian rule. By the way, this type of linguistic accord is less frequent in Estonia but it still exists and in Catalonia, it seems pretty common. The ubiquitousness of state control in (socio)linguistic areas resulted in the «unconscious adaptation to the cognitive and behavioral» pattern imposed by the regime.»2 (P. Vihalemm & Lauristin, 1997, p. 108).